eVenues Blog

One of the unique things about eVenues is that it's one of the first and only online services that enables *YOU* to price or set your price for your venue. Yup, go ahead...pick a number, any number. Depending on the venue, you might get it, but eVenues encourages "discount." We often compare ourselves to the guys down the street at Half-Price Books. Consumers bring in their already read or used books to resell to the general public for discount. So, they're effectively priced to move. Hey, what a concept?

Now, let's replace books for rooms. We've all got rooms, spaces, cubbies, garages, driveways, closets, etc. Most of the spaces sit vacant over 50% of the time. Wouldn't it be cool if we could rent it for an hour or so and make a cool $50 bucks!  Hey, that's a team lunch. One of those each week and we're now talking about paying for the utilities for a month. Eight of those over the course of a month and one on a Saturday and now we're talking FREE revenue.

But, its only going to happen if you price your venue to move. Discount it. Come up with an attractive number for 1 hr, half-day or full-day worth testing. You can develop some head-y math around the number of square feet 'x' the price per foot in your neighborhood, etc., but we feel that's a little ways off. We feel you should jump in while the crowd is small and establish a beachhead...then, grow with us!

Another good blog post by Max Kalehoff, writer for OnlineSpin, who lays out a good argument for including customers for planning any offsite meeting.

"Bottom line: customers are required to execute the most meaningful and effective management offsite meetings. They are the lifeblood of your business, so be sure to include them and make them central." - Max Kalehoff

Now, we just inspire management to come up with an effective venue!

http://www.mediapost.com/blogs/spin/?p=1376

Below is a short but great piece by Max Kalehoff, VP at Clickable, on how to plan for a great conference or event. Because of the mass of information now available on the internet, there's an argument we should all be trying to physically get together more. Hmmm, go figure. <g> The artcile covers the basics, but also gets into the importance around planning the goals and purpose of your event, which are often overlooked, such as these:

4. Enforce points of view - otherwise known as manage your speakers; make sure they present with a theme that's related to your objectives;

6. Showcase more new smart faces - bring some new people and ideas to the stage other than the regular Dilberts;

8. Serve good food - change it up from regular grub; try BBQ ribs and get messy!

However, Max eliminates one very important tip - that which I will pronouce Tip #11 in this blog - being 'Pick a great venue!' Picking the right venue can be the difference between a good piece of news or being labeled a dud. Now, we don't want that if we are a planner. So, why not make it an experience!

We at eVenues like to hear all this as many of us are trying to find or plan the next best conference. More importantly, many of us just might be sitting in a venue worth renting out!

http://blogs.mediapost.com/spin/?p=1306

Aside from planning traditional meetings, you might be trying to come up with a unique venue for a corporate or family event. The below article titled "A Dinner Served" is featured in the September 2008 edition of Coastal Living Magazine and proves you don't need a traditional dining room to hold a large event.

For those of you with an available open corn-field or barn available, why not get it up on eVenues.com - it just might make the next great party venue! 

http://www.coastalliving.com/coastal/food/entertaining/article/0,14587,1829918,00.html

Happy Planning!

Photo Copyright 2008, Coastal Living.

If you are a business trying to get rentals on eVenues you might be wondering what are some good ways to let your customers know that this service is available. Sure, we can drive some traffic through our site, and we are working night and day to help you get more, but there is an easier way. Unless your business primarily serves the Amish, you probably have a website. If you are particularly hip, you might even have a blog or MySpace profile for your venue. Why not leverage that to help you rent out the space. A quick post with a link to your listing page can make a world of difference. That's what your website is for!

Here are a few quick pointers on how to introduce this idea to your customers:

1. Think about what the value proposition is for them. If you don't know why your customers would want to use eVenues, then they won't either. 
2. Let them know what is in it for them. We know you are super excited about the possibilites of using eVenues, but your customers don't. Lead with this, then explain the rest.
3. Give a brief description of how the site works. You can always include a link to our FAQ if you think they will still be confused.
4. Include a picture of the space. This makes it much less of an abstract idea for your potential renters and more of a concrete concept.
5. Don't pressure them. Make sure that your customers know they won't be forced to rent space. The goal is not to add a cover charge to your coffee shop, but to provide a premium service for your best customers
6. Show your personality. This shouldn't come off as an advertisement, but as a trusted message from you. Keep it upbeat and friendly and you'll be fine.

This post is the first in a series describing the potential uses for the eVenues platform. The only limit on what you can do with eVenues is your imagination, which is pretty big, so we would like to help you with a few ideas to get you started. eVenues lets you rent out any space, by the hour. That space might be a chair in a hair salon or an empty board room in an office. See, now that imagination of yours is going to work again. Here are a few concrete examples of possible uses.

The Big Comfy Couch

Maybe you are the proud owner of a cafe; most people in Seattle seem to be. Every cafe has one spot that is sought after: the one where a customer will park themselves in it in the morning and never leave. Maybe it is a big couch, or a six person table big enough to serve as an office. Wouldn't it be nice if you could allow customers to reserve that spot, even for a few cents an hour. That way, you would know the spot was going to the person who wanted it the most. Plus, the coffee shop down the road isn't offering that service.

The Oversized Office

At your company do you sometimes play basketball in the unoccupied office space? Maybe you just moved into an office twice as large as your last one, but haven't hired enough staff to fill it. Maybe you got a terrific deal on a loft that just happens to be a few thousand square feet too large. There are people out there who would pay a pretty penny to rent out the space you aren't using, and who wouldn't mind leaving when you need it back. The money could pay for sweet new basketball uniforms for your office team.

Of course, these are just a couple of ideas. If you have a better idea, list it up. Its free.